Technology

A Brief introduction to Podcast

Pornless Porn Star Videos? There's an App for That
9/23/2009

CNET is reporting that Apple has approved the first 2 "Porn Star Apps" for iPhone and iPod Touch. These apps contain porn star related blogs, photos, and videos. What you won't find, however, is letter-of-the-law pornography.

In January we wrote about Apple walking the gratification tightrope when they took down an app that allowed you to enhance certain anatomical components of your own images with simulated 3D, uh, geography. One of the reasons that the Apple Store is being scrutinized in this area, is because they have made efforts to keep the iPhone Apps somewhat respectable. What they haven't done a good job of, however, is clearly defining exactly where the line of "objectionable material" lies.

I don't think these apps make your son or daughter's iPhone/iPod any more or less dangerous as a delivery mechanism for inappropriate material. A savvy (or clumsy) young person can pull up any webpage on the entire Internet via the native web browser on these devices. If you can see a website with your computer, they can see the same site with an iPhone, and probably an iPod Touch. Unless of course you put a content filter, such as SafeEyes Mobile, on it.

The reason I bring this up here, then, is to remind you that these mobile devices are constantly evolving, and it is your responsibility as a parent to keep up with the times to the best of your ability.

FULL ARTICLE:
Apple OKs First Porn Star Apps for the iPhone

digg | rss

E-Trade Baby More Fact Than Fiction?
7/10/2009

A friend shared an article with me over on the InternetSafety.com blog, based on an Associated Press story. A new Nielsen Online study asserts that 9.5 percent of internet users in May (roughly 16 million total) were between the ages of 2-11 years old.

The more things change, the more things change.

Full Article
Life Imitates Art: E-Trade Baby More Fact Than Fiction

digg | rss

Porn Fetishes and Vomit Are Hilarious. Apparently.
7/2/2009

Microsoft keeps buckling under the weight of a beast known as market share. They want more of it and it appears that they'll stoop pretty low to get it.

They've released a series of new videos for an Internet Explorer 8 ad campaign. The browser looks to be an excellent product and the ads have been doing a terrific job at raising awareness, by means of satire, of certain technological difficulties and human behaviors. This week they released a new ad that raised more than awareness, it raised a few eyebrows as well.

The premise of the video is, "Surf your porn in secret with IE8 so that your significant other doesn't discover your secret sexual fetish and vomit on you."

No, really.

They have retracted the ad which has probably helped drive traffic more than anything else. It should be noted that the feature they are touting, which allows you to surf the internet without an audit trail, is not unique to IE8. Safari, Chrome and Firefox have similar settings. "Private browsing" is here to stay, so check the settings on your family computer and make sure your kids know it is off limits in your home.

FULL ARTICLE:
Microsoft Wishes You Happy Porn Surfing

digg | rss

New Search Engine Bing Circumvents Porn Filters
6/2/2009

Everyone wants to be the new Google, even older, established companies like Microsoft. In that vein, today they launched a new search engine called Bing with a focus on trying to not only match, but also improve upon, the legendary Google search engine.

So far, no cause for alarm. Businesses compete with each other and consumers win.

In its bid to out-best the competition, however, Microsoft has added a really nifty and usable feature that has caused a bit of a digital ruckus. Bing allows you to view videos from other sites without all the hassle and page load time associated with actually making you go to the pages that have the videos on them. In fact, all you have to do is hover over one of the videos in your search results and it starts playing right there on the Bing page.

This is a terrific improvement on reducing unnecessary latency in finding what I'm looking for on the Internet. This is simultaneously a terrific way to cripple most commercial and free parental control software packages that are designed to protect your family.

This is because most of these applications rely on blacklisting Internet addresses. So if your middle school aged son does a search for sex on Google, all he gets are search results with some descriptive text and a link pointing to web sites with sexual content. If he then clicks the link to visit the site and see the videos, your web filter will recognize that the link's address is a known sexual content provider and deny access.

With Bing it's different. Your middle school aged son goes to Bing and searches for sex and the first thing that happens is a message comes back saying THE SEARCH SEX MAY RETURN EXPLICIT ADULT CONTENT. To view these videos, turn off safe search. Not only that, but the words safe search are clickable and if clicked, he is given directions on how to turn off Bing's safe search. Two clicks later, a page full of videos is returned. So far, this is not all that different than other search engines. But here is where Bing diverges from the pack. Because of the new feature, your son doesn't actually have to leave the Bing website to watch the videos. And since he is still on Bing, an approved, white-listed website, your parental control filter never has the opportunity to do its job and block the sexual content. Remember, most filters are triggered on the transition from the search engine to the target site. And this part is skipped.

SOLUTION: If you have young kids in your house and you are trying to keep your computer as family-friendly as possible, simply add bing.com to your Internet filter's blacklist. All major free and commercial packages can do this. Call technical support for your product if you do not know how.

To compound the problem, it also came out that Microsoft's Internet Explorer 6 is forcing Bing to be its default search engine. Hopefully you are using a newer version or a different browser entirely.

It should be noted that Microsoft may address this issue in the near future. They have shown that they are keen to address sexual search concerns based on the sensitivity levels of various cultures. For example, Bing works a little differently in India than here in the U.S.

This new feature isn't bad, but it does have an unfortunate side effect. Im hopeful that it will be addressed by either Microsoft, Internet content filters, or both.

Microsofts New Search Engine Puts Porn in Motion
http://tinyurl.com/npkgtr

IE6 Forcing Bing As Default Search Engine
http://tinyurl.com/o5ayy3

Searches Using 'Sex' Or 'Sexual' Are Taboo on Bing in India
http://tinyurl.com/qmtwyu

digg | rss

Porn Goes Back To Monochromatic Roots With Kindle2
5/14/2009

Before soft core porn was widely distributed on magazine stands, we had the Sears catalog. Remember that? Yeah you do. The lingerie section was replete with glorious, buxom, monochrome beauties. Well I have good (read: bad) news! Monochromatic soft core porn (and more) is back and freely available on the Amazon Kindle.

The Amazon Kindle is an eBook reader that just so happens to come with a free, no-monthly-charge Internet connection on Sprint's EVDO/CDMA network. It comes with a built-in web browser and the display boasts a delicious 16-level grayscale palette.

What once was old is new again.

I've owned a Kindle since February and I absolutely love it. I used to read a lot and now, thanks to this new toy, I'm plowing through books at a ridiculous rate. Taking notes too. And it reads (text to speech) out loud, so I can even "read" books on my commute to work.

But it does have easy access to pornography and no ability to enable parental controls. Granted, surfing porn would be slow, painful, and limited to pics only (no video). But it's worth mentioning because Amazon is now pushing to get textbooks transcribed to eBook format. Who wouldn't want all their textbooks and notes in one small device like this? I know I would.

Bill Gates envisioned a day when every home had a personal computer. It's not a stretch to presume Amazon's Jeff Bezos has similar aspirations concerning the Kindle and your teenager's backpack.

Keep your eyes on this one.

digg | rss